Chapter 14: in command of the Army of the James.
- Detailed to command -- extent of Department -- minor expeditions -- pusillanimity of the government regarding Reprisals -- Wistar's attempted surprise of Richmond and capture of Davis frustrated -- advantages of occupying Bermuda hundred noted: Grant and Butler plan its occupation -- presidential election of 1864 -- both Lincoln and Chase offer Butler the Vice-presidency -- embarkation at Yorktown and seizure of City Point -- Drury's Bluff should have been seized at once -- fortifying the neck -- minor demonstrations -- misleading despatches from the Army of the Potomac -- Butler's Corps commanders, Smith and Gillmore, insubordinate and hostile -- the fighting around Drury's Bluff -- false despatches of Grant's successes -- Butler supposes him rapidly approaching and acts accordingly
On the second day of November, 1863, without solicitation, I was detailed to the command of the Department of Virginia and North Carolina, with headquarters at Fortress Monroe. The Union forces were then in occupation of the peninsula between the York and James Rivers, up to the line of Williamsburg, the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth, and a line extending towards Suffolk, about seven miles from Norfolk, on the line of the Dismal Swamp Canal in Virginia, and by the aid of the gunboats, the Currituck, Albemarle, and Pamlico Sounds, Roanoke Island, Hatteras Bank, Morehead City, Beaufort, the line of railroad from New Berne, and the cities of New Berne, Plymouth, and Washington, and as much land as was fairly within the pickets of the garrison of those cities in North Carolina.
Upon inspection of these several posts it appeared to me that holding Washington and Plymouth was useless, because, while Washington was distant from New Berne only about twenty miles, and Plymouth perhaps a less distance from Washington by land, the enemy held the intervening territory, and the only communication between these places was by water by travelling a distance of from 120 to 170 miles. This opinion was reported to the War Department, but no action was taken, and I did not feel at liberty to order the evacuation of either place.
November 16, an expedition under Colonel Quinn, with 450 men of the One Hundred and Forty-Eighth New York Volunteers, captured a rebel marine brigade organized to prey upon the commerce of Chesapeake Bay, and a dangerous nest of pirates was broken up.
November 27, Colonel Draper, with the Sixth U. S. Colored Troops,
